Appellate Seminar

The Legislature shall also provide for the holding of District Court when the Judge thereof is absent, or is from any cause disabled or disqualified from presiding.

As the foregoing provision explains, the elected district judge is the person who can act for a district court. This is the general rule. The last sentence contains an exception. The exception is that the Legislature can provide for the holding of district court when the elected judge is absent, disabled, or disqualified from presiding.

III. The Legislature has provided for someone other than the elected district judge to preside over a district court.

But the statute is overly broad.

As envisioned by our Constitution, the Legislature has passed a statute authorizing someone other than the elected district judge to exercise a district court’s power. That statute is Section 74.056 of the Texas Government Code. The apposite portion of Section 74.056 is Subsection (a) which reads as follows: A presiding judge from time to time shall assign the judges of the administrative region to hold special or regular terms of court in any county of the administrative region to try cases and dispose of accumulated business.

There is no doubt that Section 74.056(a) allows for the appointment of a visiting judge when the elected district judge is absent, disabled, or disqualified. But there is a problem with the statute. It is overly broad. The statute does not limit the appointment of visiting judges to the circumstances spelled out in Article V, Section 7. Instead, the statute permits the appointment of a visiting judge “to try cases and dispose of 10